links for 2009-09-14

"HE'S the Leeds-loving decorator who famously refuses to use red paint because of his loathing for Manchester United". What a fantastic opening line to a story...

Screengrabs of early Internet search engines alongside their contemporary look. Phil Bradley summed it all up thus: "Then they were all different, now they all look the same, pretty much."

"So I wondered how the third group [well-intentioned 'experts' not directly involved with the council or living there] might go about putting a wishlist together of features that a Council website really ought to have, and perhaps of deciding which are the most important. These could then be documented somewhere so that Councils have a free point of reference of some good quality advice on where they should go with their website."

"It's very touching to meet women who insist that watching us [Judith Hann and Maggie Philbin] handle technology with confidence was the reason they chose careers in that area themselves."

This feverish BBC support for the 'War On Terror' will be news to those at Biased BBC who take exactly the opposite view that the BBC breathlessly undermines our armed forces and bends to appease Islamic terrorists at every turn...

I'm not saying "I told you so" about the fact that The Beatles reissues didn't tear up the album charts this weekend...but I did point out on the anniversary of the original CD reissues that only Abbey Road and Sgt Pepper made it back into the top twenty album charts in 1987.

On the revelation that Apple & EMI paid for the NME 13 cover variations stunt: "An event with lots of covers because the NME feels its an event - well, at least we know where we are. An event with lots of covers because it's partly underwritten by the company which is flogging the records it's celebrating - well, we still know where we are."